The Ministry of Power goes Solar!

The Ministry of Power plans to install a hybrid solar power system for its offices. The installation means the ministry will stop using electricity from the national grid to power its activities at its headquarters in Maitama, Abuja. The system will cost $2.5 million to install with a daytime generation capacity of 750-kilowatts.
Funding for the project has been sourced by a consortium. The changeover from grid power to solar will deliver enormous cost savings to the Ministry as the tariff for solar power is considerably lower than that of on-grid power. Furthermore, the new solar power system will provide constant 24-hours electricity leading to greater efficiency and productivity.
According to Abba Ibrahim, (the Managing Director of the appointed project team),”The Power House hybrid solar project is a pilot that came out from the Ministry of Power, Works and Housing and the whole idea is to make sure there is a decentralized distributed renewable energy source put into our power mix and this is an excellent opportunity which plugs into the current Power Sector Recovery Plan of the government.”
The project is unique as it will it reduce pressure on the national grid and supplement it at the same time. This will be achieved by feeding excess power generated by the newly installed system back to the Abuja Disco network. Solar feed In tariffs whilst common elsewhere in the world, are novel in Nigeria.
The move by the Ministry of Power to make radical changes to the way it powers its operations is a fresh and modern approach to power generation and heralds the future for power in Nigeria.
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